The original, 9-page short story version of

"LAUNCH of the CIVIC"

The original draft was written on a mechanical typewriter, with no right
margin. All spellings, punctuation, capitalizations, etc. are as in the
original.

You have been warned.

The Santa Monica Civic Auditorium; a monument to its time. Perfectly designed
so that every seat is a good seat, this auditorium won't become obsolete for
a long time.

But this place was only a dot on the map compared to the large splotch of the
Montana International Civic Auditorium. The Santa Monica Civic is almost
exactly a ½-scale model of the original construction in Montana. There
is only one question haunting everyone who goes to see any concert or event in
the big Montana house (its nickname):

Nowhere in its construction is there a plaque or cornerstone signifying when
the thing was built. An old circulating rumor kept alive 'till one major event
said that the basic construction of the Auditorium was just found out in
the middle of nowhere, along with complete electrical and lighting systems, and
the rest of the complex was just built surrounding it.

As I have said, this rumor was kept barely alive, until one major event in the
late 1980's which shocked the world.

---

It was during late August when the Queen concert had been scheduled. Queen had
recently converted over to New-Wave rock, since they had run out of ordinary
rock "songs". Almost all 3000 seats in the Montana House were sold out.
Preparations started only a week before the concert, and had to be hurried,
especially since there were only about five hired stage hands for that gigantic
theatre. One of them was an old rock fan, who shall be called "Hey Man".

Hey was in charge of setting up stage props and keeping the stage cleared of
all obstructions. He had a very big job, and when he had applied for it, he had
no idea he was going to be all alone. But after the first couple of days, he
got used to it.

The concert was to take place on a Friday and Saturday night, of course, but it
was already Wednesday. Already the arrangement of the props and part of the
lighting were planned out — now, all that had to be done was the setting
up of the several tons of garbage that Queen so inappropriately called "props".
This concert was going to be Queen's biggest ever. It was going on national TV.

As Hey was going around with the first armful of prop(s), and was about to set
them on their place on the floor, he noticed a single little black ant slowly
scurrying by. Nothing unusual about that, he'd just step on it and have it
killed. He brought his foot down on the menace, and drew it back just as
quickly. The ant was still "standing".

Nor was this unusual — in a single shoe only one-third of the sole ever
touches the ground. the rest is just for "grip" as nooks and crannys, whatever
a cranny was. Before Hey could attempt to step once more and this time crush
the pest, it was out of stomping range of his leg. Oh well, one ant isn't going
to destroy the Earth.

Finally, he laid down the first prop where it was intended to be. On Thursday,
Queen was going to have an entire practice run-through of their concert.
Crouching down on the hard wood stage to scan for the normal things stage
hand's scan for, he noticed another ant racing by. He wasn't going to
let this one get away, for there's nothing someone like Hey Man didn't
dislike more than live ants crawling around during a Queen concert.

He immediately stood up, brought his foot down on the ant, and this time
twisted it back-and-forth a few times for good measure. When he removed his
foot, the and was still alive!

Now, this was getting rediculous. No house ant known no man could ever
withstand that kind of force. However, before Hey Man could make another
crushing attempt, a third ant was discovered. Two could possibly be a
coincidence, but three ants going the same direction could only mean one thing:
an ant colony.

At once, Hey Man began to follow the third ant in the line, which not
surprisingly was soon followed up by a fourth. One of the men on lighting, upon
seeing this, inquired, "Hey! Whatcha doin', man?"

"I'm followin' these ants! I think there's an ant colony somewhere in the
theater!"

"Yeah, well you won't have much time — it's almost 5:00. We gotta be
splittin' soon."

Nevertheless, he continued to follow the ants to what may have been their lair.
After a brief moment of pursuit, he found it — a big hole in the corner
of the stage, completely infested with house ants.

Too late. It was already five, and everyone had agreed "no overtime". Aw, what
the hell. Hey Man could kill the ants the next day; very few ants "move out" at
that time — they'd probably still be there for him to spray to death with
a can of raid.

He had no idea how far from the truth he was.

——

Everybody working on the stage (now seven people) poured into the theater at
precisely 8:00 ante meridean. The stage setup had to be hurried because Hey Man
was a notoriously slow worker, especially because had these big worries the
previous day about this one ant colony. Hey Man was still going to kill them.

The first thing he did when he arrived (at 8:01, as usual) was go into the
supply room and pick up a can of "Raid ant and road killer". Following this, he
stormed across the backstage area and finally re-encountered the ant colony. He
knew he must've been imagining things, but it seemed to have grown slightly
since last he saw it.

And if it was growing, then he had no time to waste. With a vigorous
shake of the can, and an inaccurate aiming of the nozzle, Hey Man pressed the
large circular button on the red-and-white can. A cone of mist sprayed soundly
out the front, making a pool of odorsome liquid surrounding the ants, with them
completely engulfed. The ants kept on moving as if nothing had happened.

Hey Man stood up, greatly astonished. No ant in existence has ever had a chance
against 2,2-Dichlorovinyl dimethyl phosphate (the number one active ingredient
in Raid), so why did a whole ant colony remain unaffected? He had to examine
these ants more closely. He stooped down onto his knees, and selected one ant
to examine extremely close up.

The ant was black, alright — but a little too shiny for Hey Man's liking.
He had to test it more thoroughly. He brought his thumb down on the ant, and
twisted it a few times. An ant was covered by a hard shell, but this one was
too hard, too cold, and too ... metallic.

Now, a new thought entered Hey Man's head: was that a real ant? He had
to solve this, and soon — he should've gone back to work a couple of
minutes ago. Scanning the immediate area, he came across an item that had been
there for over a week — a six-inch diameter rock that had been left from
the previous rock concert. He quickly scooped it up in his hands, and brought
it down on the ant, surely crushing it.

As he lifted the rock, he finally saw the ant as being crushed. He once again
crouched down to examin the remains of the "ant". Instead of splattered ant
guts with a timy amount of blood, there was a small pile of scattered
aluminum-like metal shards. What nobody knew or would probably never find out
(until five months later when Hey Man described the shards precisely under
hypnosis) was that the aluminum shards were really made of titanium, the
perfect metal.

Hey Man had no more "leisure" time — he had to get back to work before
Queen arrived. Little did he know that it was the time he was working that was
the time he was wasting.

——

The stage was sat up just in time — with only thirty seconds to spare.
Queen entered, and began their run-through, starting with "I'm Gonna Rock You
'Till You're Stoned". Hey Man's job had ended for a long time, and now he could
watch Queen practice for free. As most people, Hey Man didn't like just
standing or sitting in one place, so he began to walk around backstage. And
from some inspiration both conscious and subconscious, he was walking back
toward the ant colony. When he arrived, he was not very much surprised to
discover the ant colony had doubled in size.

He had to find out what was the secret behind that colony of robot ants. With
trembling hands, he shoved them through the writhing colony down to the bare
corner below. Quickly, he threw the gigantic handful by his side, and looked
down through the hole. Normally, an ant colony would have hundreds of little
tunnels, just barely big enough for a few of the argentine ants to pass through
at a time. This one passed down a few inches, and then stopped at a big,
psychedic 3" by 3" panel.

Hey Man knew that the ants (or whatever they were) would be crawling all over
his arms by now. When he glanced down at his upper body extremeties, he saw
them completely bare up to his short-sleeve T-shirt. All the ants were making
a mad dash for the corner hole. Before the hole refilled, however, Hey Man got
a closer look at the "psychedic" panel. It was actually a very regular array of
about fifty by fifty tiny dots of a few different colors. Just before all the
ants refilled into the corner, Hey Man could've sworn he'd seen tiny,
microscopic markings in each of the dots. Was this a robot's button panel?

He would never be able to find out for sure. And nobody else would know until
after the event that took place the next day, or rather, the next night.

——

The Friday night crowd was jammed in around the theater, hoping for each person
that there'd be a scalper selling one of the remaining tickets for the over
3000 seats in the tiny theater. It was no wonder that Hey Man was working as an
usher for the odd new-wave fans who refuse to ush. National TV cameras were
surrounding the theater from both inside and out to scan the crowd.

No one was certain exactly why Queen chose such a small theater for their
performance. If they had gone about it sensibly, they would have chosen a
gigantic outdoor theater. For this reason, it was no wonder that loudspeakers
were placed all around outdoors, and parking was unusually expensive for those
without tickets. Because of the loudspeakers outside, there were that many more
bootleggers and TV/movie camerapeople outside as well as in.

The biggest crowd was mobbed near the entryway, letting up only for large
groups of people with tickets, who had not all arrived yet. But within a few
minutes, all 3005 (the theater was oversold, as usual) ticket holders had
arrived.

The entryway was lit by six large light stands, about a hundred feet tall, at
the top of which were eight giant floodlamps, pouring off-white light onto the
large white sidewalk. Hey Man couldn't help staring into the large crowd,
picking out each female which fit his taste.

The crowd was all watching through the doors, hoping to get a glance at Queen,
and listening to the loudspeakers for when the concert would start. Not a soul
was watching the intense lights that guided their path. So it was no wonder
that at first, no one noticed the change.

Hey Man was one of the first people to notice it. The light output was
gradually becoming more intense, and the subtle yellowish-white was slowly
fading into a piercing, harsh, deep sky-blue. And soon, everyone outside began
to notice it, as well.

Then, along with the light came a low rumbling sound, slowly increasing its
decibell rating, and sweeping through the cycle of frequencies as some species
of birds do. Octive upon octive mounted onto the ever-loudening sound.
Everyone, whether outside or inside the theater, could hear the sound. But no
one knew its meaning. Queen had never sounded like this before. At
least, not this loud.

The blue-white light suddenly began to grow in its effected area. It swept over
the entire outside of the theater like a slowly approaching giant casting its
shadow on the land below. Slowly, the entire Montana Civic Auditorium was
bathed in this awesome light.

The sound in the background had already gone too high for human hearing —
over 20,000 cycles. But suddenly, the sound returned to its original ultra-low
intensity, only this time with the mounted decibells producing an
ear-shattering roar.

Then, suddenly, another change took place. The blue-white light lost both its
whiteness and its blueness, and faded backwards through the light spectrum
— first to green, then to yellow, orange, red — and beyond. The
crowd that was forcing its way back out the front doors (of whom almost a
thousand had successfully made it out) suddenly became aware of a new sensation
present in the deep red light — a sensation of heat. Cries of "that
things too hot!" and "Yeeow! I'm burnin' up by the doorway!" were heard echoing
throughout the theater entrances and exits. The whole place was sealed off by
the heat.

Soon, the heat became so intense that anyone attempting to pass through the
doors was instantly burnt up. Although a few were shoved through the deadly
inferno, almost all of the remaining 2000 (or really a bit more) people stood
clear of the doors. There was no way that they were going through those
doors.

The circular crowd around the theater, realizing its head, suddenly increased
its radius by about thirty feet. Then, something happened that was completely
catastrophic.

No concrete, cement, or mortal has ever been able to stand up to extremely
intense heat, whether their molecules actually separate, or the constructions
expand so far that they crack. The construction encircling the Montana
International Civic Auditorium was no exception. Within a matter of seconds,
the giant concrete towers surrounding Montana House began to shake and crumble.
Huge pieces of staging houses tumbled to the earth, crushing innocent citizens
below them like Hey Man had crushed the robot ant. Soon, even the plaster
decoration surrounding the posts holding the deadly light began to split and
rupture from the heat and the sound, leaving only bare titanium poles to
support them. It didn't take a genius to figure out that the head was coming
from infrared light being emitted from the "lamp posts".

Now, the Montana International Civic Auditorium was only the bare minimum of
two shallow dishes of sheet titanium set one on top of the other. The lamp
posts, which up 'till then had been just hanging out there in front of it,
supported by metal planks running all the way to the center underside of the
Montana House, now had giant cables extending from the metal base plates all
the way up to the halfway point on the tall posts.

Suddenly, the light from the posts began to change again, only this time
forward through the spectrum, from deep red all the way back to
blue-white. Then, the most awe-inspiring effect took its toll — the Civic
Auditorium was actually lifting up off the ground! And as it did, the cables
extended to the lamp posts began to pull the posts in toward the body, along
with the metal planks pulling in to increase the streamlineness of the place.

Say, if the deep red was hot, and nobody noticed any heat in the blue light
before, they maybe this blue light ... — these were exactly Hey Man's
thoughts. Cautiously, he approached the gleaming blue doorway, using the
heat-sensitive nerves of his nose as a guide. He felt no heat at one meter
proximity ... at one foot ... at one cm. Could it be as heatless as he had
predicted? There was only one way to find out — and he had to do it
quickly, for the Auditorium was swiftly gaining height.

Tensing his entire body, and at the same time looking the other way, Hey Man
thrust his right hand through the screen of blue light. No pain was emitted
whatsoever, but he had to take a look just to be sure. His hand was still on
the end of his arm, completely unharmed.

He had no time to lose; the newly borne airship was over twenty feet off the
ground. He threw his bodyweight through the shimmering portal, stretching his
arms out wide to act as a make-shift parachute against the ever-present air. As
he both sailed and fell to the ground, his mind was in a state of panic,
thinking at several times its normal speed. I suppose he was thinking over all
that had happened in those last few minutes, but he would never have remembered
it, anyway

He came down on a cushion of soft grass that had been grown immediately
surrounding the Montana International Civic Auditorium. He was saved,
indirectly, by the same thing that had almost killed him! Now his only thought
was on that ascending airship.

With two thousand people inside, the airship rose higher and higher, faster and
faster. Suddenly, when it had achieved about five hundred meters altitude, it
shot into the air like a champaigne cork. Soon, it disappeared from view, but
just before it did, the "airship" (now obviously a spaceship) changed its
blue-white shell to a deep purple, and probably kept going, on to ultraviolet,
X-rays, Gamma rays, and beyond.

It could never be tracked as to which star it came from, for as soon as it left
Earth orbit, it became invisible to all light ... including radar waves. Rock
fans all over the USA would mourn the "loss" of the new wave group Queen.

---

The story you have just heard was true. The names were changed to protect the
innocent.

My mention of, and interest in, the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium was
because I'd performed in the annual
Stairway of the Stars concert there as a Junior High and High School
chorister, more than once. I'd also read an article about this venue in the
Santa Monica Evening Outlook (a now-defunct newspaper), which described
it as a "small" concert hall. To me at the time, though, its 1500 seats could
accomodate an unthinkably large audience.

Unlike most teen-agers, I took no interest in contemporary popular music.
All those "rock bands" my brother liked to listen to just kind of melded
together into one big agglomeration of noise. I spent more time listening to
John Williams's soundtrack album for Star Wars than I did listening to
all the rock albums in the house combined. Hence, my writing of rock
"songs" with "songs" in double-quotes, and the rather ludicrous notion that
Queen would switch over to New Wave (not that I had any idea what distinguished
New Wave music from conventional rock).

"whatever a cranny was" came from an episode of Lidsville. Horatio
J. Hoodoo ordered his flunkies to clean every nook and cranny of his home. He
passed out brooms, saying "You get the nooks, and you get the crannies" —
to which the bird he'd handed the last broom to asked, "What's a cranny,
boss?"

Way back in The Whitemail Machine,
which I wrote more than 5 years prior to this story, I spelled it "rediculas."
Now, in this story, I progressed to spelling it "rediculous." One of these days
I'm going to spell it right, I tell you!

Note that Hay Man was able to get an extreme closeup view of an ant without
needing a magnifying glass. This is because, at the time I was writing this, I
was beginning to get nearsighted — and as a consequence I could hold an
object very close to my face and see it in full detail without it being
blurry. I just assumed at the time that everyone could do this. To this day,
I do closeup examinations of things like old coins by simply removing my
glasses or contact lenses.

So far as I have been able to ascertain, Queen has never recorded or
performed a song titled "I'm Gonna Rock You 'Til(l) You're Stoned." Certainly
not back during the Freddie Mercury era.

By "psychedic," I think I probably meant "psychedelic."

The hundred-foot-tall light stands in the "entryway" was my rather clumsy
description of the front of the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, an evening photo
of which appears at the top of
this Santa Monica Mirror article from 2011. It was this view of the
building, along with the side view (not shown in the linked article), which
served as the original inspiration for my whole "hey, it kinda looks like a
space ship!" notion.

Pity the musician who doesn't spell "octave" correctly.

Notice that the building became sealed off by intense heat once the lights
had progressed down through the rainbow and, most likely, into the infrared.
This probably came from the popular — and incorrect — notion that
infrared = heat. While it's true that objects at room temperature emit
infrared light in the low frequency part of the infrared range, any
frequency of light will cause something to warm up if it's absorbed. This is
how the sun heats the Earth, for example.

I'm not entirely sure what I meant by "Religion was never like this." I
did, however, have a quasi-spiritual streak in me at the time I wrote this
story.